Trees of Life.
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93, I've heard of varying Trees of Life, but haven't seen them or searched them out. I got a book called "Personal Kabbalah" by Penny Cohen, that lists a Lurianic and a Cordovero Tree. I couldn't find any info on these, but did find the Cordovero Tree also called the Byzant Tree. So how many models are there, and what makes any one better than the othes?
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93,
Asking which is "better" could well miss the point - success is your only proof, after all.
My view is, it's like the various models of the solar system. The Greeks had a geocentric one, then Ptolemy offered us epicycles. Tycho Brahe's hybrid model was close to the truth, but Copernicus' had the planets and the Sun arranged properly - though moving in circles. And then came Kepler's, which correctly showed them all moving in ellipses.
Bu they all worked relatively well for the needs of their time. Today, launching a space probe to encounter a planet at one of its epicycle points wouldn't be very useful.
The Tree we have today in Hermetic magick is a highly evolved and workable system. Its apparent lack of logic in certain places actually means it works better as a psychospiritual model than a more rigidly symmetrical system. But Crowley also warned that the Tree we have now is still an arbitrary model if viewed from an imaginary, absolute standpoint.
In the absence of teleportation to get us to work on time, a bus isn't a bad substitute.
93 93/93,
Edward
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Still doesn't answer my question about the models, etc. I believe perhaps I spoke too quickly as far as the better part. What's the difference on a respective basis of these different models? The names of the models? Any ideas where I can find info?
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93,
Remember there's Hebraic Kabbalah out there, which is different to Hermetic Qabalah, in the same way that Judaism is to Christianity. Jewish Kabbalists continually developed (and develop) their own systems. You would need someone who practises those traditions to answer that question. Isaac Luria had his approach (usually called Lurianic Kabbalah), Cordovero had his, Nachmanides had his, and so on. But generally, those lineages don't have designating names, beyond those of their primary teachers. The accepted Jewish Kabbalists are usually seen as presenting facets of one great Judaic tradition.
Note the Q for Hermetic Qabalah and the K for Hebraic Kabbalah - it's a spelling convention that helps differentiate those systems at sight.
The model Crowley worked with derived directly from the Golden Dawn's Minutum Mundum diagram of the Tree. He refined and perfected it, but didn't alter much except to correct the attributions of Heh and Tzaddi. Some French Qabalists (I've read) switch the Aeon and Fool cards around, William Gray came up with his own version (which I think is off the wall), Frater Achad up-ended it, and so on. But the Tree you'll see most is that Golden Dawn Tree. It's the one most written about in English, and the one that would usually be discussed on this site.
93 93/93,
Edward
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Several different trees are described in Decker and Dummet's History of the Occult Tarot.
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93, Thanks guys. Some of this I already know. Not sure why Luria's name didn't click. Never seen his Tree, just heard of him. I learned on the Golden Dawn Tree, which looks rather like this Cordovero\Byzant Tree. I'm just exploring it all a bit as one my practices.
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Don't forget the Xian Cabala (with a C). Athanasius Kircher and Georg von Welling wrote extensively on the Cabala,* et.al*. It had a significant impact on the Qabalah for about 200 years (1590-1790 e.v.).
Wtih much Peace,
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Many C/K/Qabalists also build up theory based on the idea that the Tree(s) have changed. I don´t know really if Crowley meant that the change of Tzaddi and what it further implies is something that came along with the new Aeon or something that he would argue was wrong from the beginning of that specific map.
However, many other have had the idea that for instance the instance called "The Fall" changed the Tree(s) drastically, for instance creating Malkuth that was not there before and reattributing some paths.
This is discussed in Gerschom Scholems books, for instance KABBALAH, and Thomas Karlssons "Qabalah, Qliphoth and Goetic Magic".